Jay-R does OPM, R&B- style

CEBU, Philippines - Prince of R&B Jay-R will be rooting in the crowd come coronation night for his girlfriend who is vying for one of the crowns in this year's Binibining Pilipinas pageant.

Former Gobingo girl and Bb. Pilipinas 2010 contender Krissa Mae Arrieta (her real name is Krista Arrieta Kleiner) began dating the singer early last year.

"I'll be there to support her," Jay-R says in a brief interview with The FREEMAN at Laguna Garden in Ayala Terraces after the recently-held "Convergys-Bench Wear Your Dreams" fashion show. He entertained the crowd at the event with his R&B tunes together with fellow R&B artists Kyla and Kris Lawrence.

Did Krissa Mae ask for his permission before deciding to join the prestigious beauty tilt? "She doesn't need to naman. Syempre, that's good for her self-esteem and her career to be a part of Binibini. I'm not gonna hold her back at all," he says.

Asked if he doesn't cringe at the thought of a big crowd ogling at his woman for the much-awaited swimsuit portion, he answers, "It's not okey pero I have no choice but to take it like a man."

New Album

Jay-R has a lot on his hands this year. He just held a Valentine concert with Kyla and Kapamilya artists Billy Crawford and Nikki Gil at the SM Mall of Asia. He also cannot wait to greenlight the launch of his upcoming album under Universal Records.

"It's called 'Jay-R Sings OPM Love Songs'. Pretty exciting kasi magaganda yung mga arrangement. Binago namin yung mga classic Tagalog songs, ginawa naming modern R&B, we remade them and tried to make them my own. I'm really excited to hear the reaction of the audience," he shares.

He adds: "This year, I really want to achieve a lot. I want to release two artists under my label, I wanna sell at least gold for each of them. For my album, I wanna sell a double platinum. Everyone's selling like triple platinum and diamond records, di ba? So I want to at least sell a double platinum. And I just wanna keep my businesses growing and manage everything well. Yun lang, just to work hard lang talaga is what I expect from myself."

On SOP

Reports have recently confirmed that the long-running Sunday variety show SOP is finally bowing down after a reformat done late last year has failed to salvage its ratings. The replacement will now be called "Party Pilipinas" and will air its first episode on March 21.

During our interview with Jay-R when these developments have not yet surfaced, The FREEMAN asked Jay-R for his thoughts on the reformatting done last year, which was said to leave some artists disgruntled.  

"We're going for a younger look now. We're targeting the younger market so it's totally different because the old SOP, the target talaga was older women and the older crowd na tuwing Sunday walang trabaho," he explains. "Ngayon, it's different. Yung mga artista sa stage, we're trying to make and dress them hip and younger. Kahit yung stage namin eh, it's all young. Other people may interpret it differently, they're thinking that we're doing something wrong, but we're just targeting the younger audience."

"Personally, I have no complaints because they're giving me a lot of exposure and they're giving me the songs that I wanna sing. I'm having fun naman sa stage, and that's all I could ask for naman eh."

Along with the four main hosts Regine Velasquez, Ogie Alcasid, Janno Gibbs, the R&B pair of Jay-R and Kyla, plus La Diva were said to have been retained.